Going on a trip this upcoming week, which will definitely cut my writing time down. And I'm also behind by about two days. I'm still optimistic about finishing this year's NaNo - It'll be my... eighth? I think?

Furiosa, War Boys, Wives, Ace, world-building, angst, pre-canon, post-canon Wow. Wow. Even if you aren't in the Mad Max fandom, you should read this fanfic.Through connected short stories, eag explores the world and characters of Mad Max: Fury Road. Not just explore - eag builds them. The depth of these stories, the depth of these characters! I've read each of the parts... six? Ten? Maybe a dozen times and each read-through I learn more.

And damn, is there a lot to read. As of January 2016, the series is over 160,000 words. This is a tome-sized fanfic. And it's just as complex as well-written as any professional piece of fiction. If it were published in a book, I’d buy the hell out of it. I can’t rec this series hard enough. The complexity of the characters’ growth, and the joy of their triumphs and pain of their suffering gives them all such a pathos - Especially when you know their ultimate fate.

current mood: amused
current song: crawl out through the fallout >> sheldon allman

A Toast to the Future by juliettdeltaSlit/Toast, romance, world-building, post-canon fix-it, 23/?? (incomplete)juliettdelta is another author that writes consistently amazing fic. This one is probably my favorite because the world-building is so fascinating. Gastown and the Bullet Farm are really great - creepy and horrible, with juliettdelta’s own unique spin on those places and what happens there. And Toast! And Slit! I really love how they’re both trying so damn hard, sometimes struggling or even fighting to get what they can out of the harsh environments that make up their lives. But they always remain interesting and sympathetic. I think they can both be difficult characters to write, but juilettdelta nails it.

He completely wiped the spare phone. Numbers, old messages, photographs were all gone at once - he'd give it back to his boss at Ulysses to foist on whoever took his place. Ryuji's primary phone, his personal phone, that he'd have to go through one at a time. There were numbers he needed to keep: the guys from the park, some friends from the bar he'd stay in touch with, his landlord, even a couple of cousins he hadn't seen in years. And Saki, of course. Just hovering over her entry made him smile a little.

He needed a picture of her. More than one, he thought as he stared at the screen. And not just of her, of them together. He tapped his heels energetically on the floor of the subway car as he thought about all the places they go together. Another amusement park, definitely. With or without a conspiracy and megalomaniac costumed villains - He could take more on, no sweat, even with his stitches and his bruised ribs. Less time for romance though, he considered, imagining a Ferris wheel ride with her or a haunted house ride where he could pull her onto his lap and find her face in the dark with his hands.

More people got on the closer he got to Ginza, and he gave his seat to a tiny old dude with a tinier kid that had to be his granddaughter.

Could be me someday, he thought and grinned over the old guy's head.

He deleted the rest of the numbers in his phone without paying much attention to what he was doing. Scroll, delete, scroll, delete - Until huge chunks of his contact list were gone.

A chapter in his life was over. A whole damn book. He'd been alone since his parents had died; his grandmother had tried but she didn't fit in his life, or maybe he hadn't fit into hers. And his clients were clients. Ryuji slid his phone into his pocket and ran his hand through his hair as he thought. He liked them and he'd miss them, some more than others, but whatever he'd had with them wasn't a relationship. It wasn't friendship. They'd been good times, based on a common need, and he didn't regret any of it - not being in a gang and not being a host. But none of them even knew his name.

Maybe he didn't even know theirs.

To Ryuji, it was honesty that trumped everything else. Saki knew him, all of what he was and what he wanted to be. And she loved him, not anyway, not in spite of, but because.

He grinned again and pulled out his phone to look at her number again. Quickly he began to search online for an image to use for her until he got a real photograph - And found the perfect one: a cat with small ears, big eyes, and dark fur around its round face.

Title: MagophonyFandom: Dragon Age 2Rating: PG13ishWarnings: Not-particular-graphic violence, slaveryAuthor's note: This was my entry for dragonagebb. It could have used a beta, but I procrastinated like mad and barely got it in on time as it is.

The Gabled WindowWorking on: Uncovering the big baddie's plot.Word for this chapter: 54

So I'm about 5k behind schedule. I'm a little disappointed in myself, but life's been shitty recently and you do what you can. The positive thing about this nano attempt is that it's been more cohesive than the previous years', so maybe I'm finally getting a hang of this here plotting business.

Charade became a courier before she could read. She excelled at it - not because a child couldn't have secrets, but because she couldn't be coerced into divulging them. Mara had always called her a stubborn child, a superlative her mother had always said like a compliment and not a criticism. Charade was stubborn and was good at dodging, at denying, and at flat-out lying. By the time she was twelve she had a reputation in the darkness of Val Royeaux's back alleys. L'ombre, they called her. Shadow.

Charade kept secrets, hoarding them like the nobles did gold. And she didn't need one of the ornate masks that the upperclass wore to hide her face. Hardly anyone noticed a thin, street-dusty girl anyway, and with her quickness they didn't have to see more than a flicker of cloth before she turned a corner.

As she learned to decipher the thin loops and swirls of the written word, she sometimes opened letters. Only the poorly sealed ones, those she could close up again without the recipient knowing. it didn't take long for her to realize that were really only three types of letters: I love you, I hate you, I'll kill you. Variations, of course, or funny combinations. She liked to imagine what happened after they were read, if the words ever came true. After dropping off a particularly amusing one, Charade bought an only somewhat bruised apple from her earnings and sat on a nearby staircase and decided that she'd never be mad over anyone like that. Never ever.

Letters didn't get delivered directly to the target, but to sympathetic butlers and maids in on the conspiracy. Charade never entered through the front doors, and instead slipped into kitchens or cellars like the servants. As she grew older, she spent more time with the kitchen girls and serving boys, flirting for gifts of wine and pastries with cream so light it seemed to float off the dough. She brought these gains back to her mother, who never asked where or how.

Her dark robes puddled around her legs as she sat on the floor of her room, trying to meditate. Nadia had been working on clearing her mind for what felt like hours, attempting to ignore the clicks and whirls of the engine and the clank of boots across metal floors, but when someone knocked on her door, she gave up completely. It wasn't an excuse to stop, she told herself as she rose to her feet, it was simply being polite. Her knees cracked as she moved and she banished an angry word from the tip of her tongue before she started cursing.

When Nadia opened the door Felix Iresso, the soldier her master had plucked from the icy tundra of Hoth, grinned down at her. He was in his armor still, the white of Republic soldiers with orange stars on his shoulders. "Hey. I'm not interrupting, am I?"

"No, not at all," she assured him hurriedly. They hadn't spoken much, but she was pleased to see him and not Tharan Cedrex. "I was just... thinking."

"Probably have a lot to think about," he said mildly. "Congratulations on it. Your dad would be proud. So what do I call you? Jedi Nadia? Master Grell?"

Nadia waved her hands to dismiss the titles. "Neither. I'm just a padawan, not a Jedi yet. And definitely not a Master. Just Nadia is fine. Um. What should I call you? You were a Lieutenant, right?"

"Still am." He rubbed the back of his neck and Nadia could feel - through the Force like a real Jedi! - a wave of affection as he thought about his unit. At that moment she felt a closeness to him; she understood the confusing jumble of conflicting emotions that were created upon Master Sade's acceptance. There was no way to cut through the ties to one's old life, and even with all that a position on the Defender could offer, anxiety and regret still bound her. Nadia studied him with new interest and he grinned again under her inspection. This smile was more sheepish and made him look more like a big brother than a commanding officer. "But you're not one of my boys; you don't have to call me LT."

Nadia had heard Tharan and Zenith refer to him as Iresso, but Master Sade used his given name. Neither seemed right to Nadia, one too distant and one too close, so instead she echoed, "LT. I like it. Can I call you that? Is that ok?"

"Sure. Now, I came down to tell you that food's ready. You hungry?"

"I'll come up," she answered and followed him up the stairs.

"Good excuse as any to put off training, huh?" he said over his shoulder at him. She ducked her head and mumbled something into her robes and he chuckled. "Don't worry - I won't tell your master on you."

SpringIt's not quite dawn and when Sapphire climbs up and out of the guild's cemetery entrance the sky above her head is the same murky color as the water in the Ragged Flagon. The secret door grinds to a close behind her and she kicks her boot against the fake tomb to clean it. After those two movements the graveyard is silent - she listens, a thief's habit - and slides around the graves.

There's a crunch to her left and Sapphire whirls with a blade in each hand. Her target lowers the bread from her mouth and swallows loud in the still air. "Looks like I'm not the only early riser," the woman says with a low laugh.

A plan flits lightning fast through her brain: sprint forward, slice the woman's throat, and stuff the corpse in the Rataway before the guard's patrol. Another unexplained death, something for the Jarl to titter over, but nothing more. But Sapphire hesitates, and she never hesitates and she hates that she is now, and the woman speaks again, voice still soft, "The affairs of the living are no concern of mine."

The lack of fear - the lack of caring about it at all surprises Sapphire. The woman, perched on a grave like she's part of the stone, stares as Sapphire spins her knives and tucks them away. "The gravedigger," Sapphire says. She recognizes Arkay's priest, now that sun is beginning to flicker through the mist. Everyone in Riften knows of Alessandra, or knows as much as they're able. Arkay keeps the dead and His priests as close as dead as possible. Sapphire convinces herself that there's no risk in letting Alessandra see the passageway. "Who would you tell, anyway? The skeletons you sleep with?"

"No one keeps secrets quite like the dead," the priest acknowledges. She finishes her bread and brushes the crumbs from her robe. The dawn is bright enough now that when she looks up, Sapphire can see the glint of her eyes, the lines of her mouth. "I'd give you blessings, but it doesn't look like you really need them. If you ever do, you know where to find me."

When the priest turns away, Sapphire pulls a knife out again. A flick of her wrist and it'd be in Alessandra's back. But she keeps it in her hand, the metal cool against her palm, and watch priest's robes sway as she walks back to the temple. Sapphire almost follows - what does she have to do today, anyway? Something for Brynjolf, something for Maven, nothing important - but then she hears the scruff of boots on gravel.

The guard who turns the corner and walks into the cemetery doesn't see anything but graves and grass.

In my headcanon, my SWTOR characters cross paths and form relationships with each other: Agent Asjary was at the same Academy with Quinn and competed with him to be the star pupil which resulted in some glorious hate sex; when they run into each other, she needles him unrelentlessly about being a Sith's lap dog and he mocks her low military rank. Warrior Kezmir hates that someone else has touched her property and is convinced that Vector is just a Quinn fill-in. Vector likes everyone.

Bounty Hunter Torv went to the Academy too, but got booted out early do to discipline issues. He has a crush on every boy - Lohkin, Vector, Quinn, Revel... - and has a habit of running into Trooper Ethrens, who keeps trying to get him to defect to the Republic so they can get married. Ethrens' older sister is a smuggler who does a lot of unsavory deals with the Empire; Cirawel had business with Asjary once, not realizing Az was an Imp spy. Not that Cirawel would have cared. She had a drunken fling with Kaliyo that left some scars and knows of Mako, but she's secretly glad that she doesn't have to work with either of them since they'd both upstage her. She's slowly becoming more loyal to the Republic under the influence of her crew.

Jedi Consular Sade keeps getting tangled in diplomatic issues that Vector is somehow always a part of, and she's convinced that Asjary is an assassin sent to destroy her/the Council. Az doesn't give a shit about Sade, though she has a passing interest in what Iresso has locked up in his head. They crash into each other as they're both escaping from some prison or something, and Sade's like, "you'll never get me, imperial" and Az is like, "brb loling forever."

Kezmir's run into Sade, too, and wants to crush her bones into a fine paste and spread it on crackers. Which is how she feels about most people, though, so Sade doesn't take it personally. Kezmir also wants to destroy Sade's padawan, but mostly out of jealousy because she doesn't have her own apprentice yet.

They stood at attention while he made inspections, two neat lines. When Jorgan got to Iresso, the solider managed to still look pleased with himself, despite the neutral expression. Jorgan ignored it as he searched through Iresso's uniform and bunk. Finding nothing out of order, at least nothing big enough to pull him out for, he finally gave in and motioned to the new tattoo. "You lose a bet, solider?"

Iresso grinned. "Got it in Nar Shaddaa during last shore leave, sir."

"Uh huh. Regulation number 670-1-"

"Refer to hair and cosmetics," he interrupted, then added at Jorgan's stare, "sir. I checked before I had it done."

He was still standing at attention, hands clasped behind him, shoulders flat, head up. And still grinning. Jorgan let that slide; Iresso was a good soldier, stupid personal decisions aside. It was a big one, from cheek down to collar. Some bad interpretation of Zabrak tattoos, Jorgan thought. "Had to be the face, huh."

"Hurt like a bitch, sir," Iresso replied cheerfully.

"You should the one Lir got!" Kaelan called out, and Iresso added with a snicker, "More like where he got it."

Down the line Lir leaned out of attention, shooting Iresso a dirty look. Jorgan snorted. "You can keep that to yourself, Lir."

The coldness of Skyrim extended to its people, and even in the crowded city of Windhelm she felt alone. Her entrance had been inauspicious: she’d interrupted a shake-down of sorts; two men intimidating a woman, who’d stood her ground despite the abuse. Things hadn’t improved from there. She walked from the slums to the estates and back through again, pausing at the graveyard, then warming her hands at the blacksmith’s fire.

There was a beggar there, a woman in rags who coughed and shivered, and nearly wept when Inswe fished a septim from her pouch. The guards walked by them like they were invisible.

She found Wylandriah’s soul gem and left the White Phial quickly, pulling her hood up and crossing her arms tight over her chest. Somehow it was colder than Winterhold, even without the snow and wind, and she made her way down the icy stone streets as swiftly as she could, ready to retreat back to the sun-dappled Riften. At the gates was another beggar and when she came closer she recognized him: one of the pair who’d harassed Suvaris.

He thanked her when he took her coin, giving no indication of recognition. But perhaps he couldn’t see her face under her hood. “I could be an elf,” she said, and he frowned down at her.

“Are you?”

She pulled the hood down, exposing her round ears. “Breton. But you couldn’t have known that.”

“No,” he said and stared at the septim lying flat in his wide palm. “Do you want this back?”

It was cold and it was dark, and Inswe was tired of the city and of Nords in general. “No, keep it. Go to the inn, get a warm meal.”

The guards pulled the gates banging closed behind her and Inswe didn’t look back until she’d passed Kynesgrove and all she could see off the city was its walls.

TVTropes whhhhhhy. I've been on this site all morning, ignoring all the work that piled up over the weekend. TVTropes, I wish I could quit you.

The site should have a way to make pages for your own characters. I know that would take a ridiculous amount of space, but unreasonableness aside, it be fun to make cohesive lists of the tropes that your characters, stories, universes make use of.

It was nearly a vacation, and she laughed a bit of the irony of that realization. The Republic certainly knew how to build their prisons - another hallmark of their ineffectiveness.

She searched through the corpse of one of the unlucky guards, rifling through bloody pockets until she found the woman's passcodes. They moved out of the sunlight, back to the relative protection that the large coiling trees gave, and as she leaned against the cool wood, she compared it again to the massive prison the Empire had built to contain it's secrets. If Watcher X had been sent to Belsavis instead of Nar Shaddaa -

It was pointless to extrapolate on the past. Az dusted off her gloves and checked her map. All she could do was keeping moving forward.